Pub Date : 2021-07-22DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192894922.003.0005
G. Smith
The 1880s were a productive decade for Twain as four of his books—The Prince and the Pauper (1881), Life on the Mississippi (1883), Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (1889)—were published. Huckleberry Finn is replete with religious themes. During the 1880s, Twain promoted social reform through his writing, speaking, and activities in Hartford and condemned racial discrimination. Although he did not share all their theological convictions, Twain applauded and supported the efforts of Social Gospelers to curb industrial ills, decrease poverty, and assist immigrants. Twain especially strove to improve politics, reduce racism, and improve the opportunities and status of women, and he denounced materialism, avarice, and fraudulent business practices.
{"title":"The 1880s","authors":"G. Smith","doi":"10.1093/oso/9780192894922.003.0005","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780192894922.003.0005","url":null,"abstract":"The 1880s were a productive decade for Twain as four of his books—The Prince and the Pauper (1881), Life on the Mississippi (1883), Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (1889)—were published. Huckleberry Finn is replete with religious themes. During the 1880s, Twain promoted social reform through his writing, speaking, and activities in Hartford and condemned racial discrimination. Although he did not share all their theological convictions, Twain applauded and supported the efforts of Social Gospelers to curb industrial ills, decrease poverty, and assist immigrants. Twain especially strove to improve politics, reduce racism, and improve the opportunities and status of women, and he denounced materialism, avarice, and fraudulent business practices.","PeriodicalId":41060,"journal":{"name":"Mark Twain Annual","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"85025726","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-07-22DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192894922.003.0008
G. Smith
Understanding what Twain believed about religious matters is complicated by his desire not to hurt Livy, her censorship of some of his writings, his wanting to avoid being attacked for his skeptical positions, and his wish to not tarnish his reputation or hinder the sale of his books. Twain withheld many religious views he thought his Hartford neighbors would consider outrageous or heretical. Examining Twain’s own statements, comments by his family, friends, and acquaintances, his funeral and obituaries, and the conflicting views of scholars, the author rejects both the arguments that Twain was an atheist, an agnostic, or a heretic and that many of his views accorded with conventional Christian faith. Instead, he argues that the religious views he expressed throughout his life are complicated and often contradictory; they convey his strong desire to make sense of the universe and his own life.
{"title":"Conclusion","authors":"G. Smith","doi":"10.1093/oso/9780192894922.003.0008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780192894922.003.0008","url":null,"abstract":"Understanding what Twain believed about religious matters is complicated by his desire not to hurt Livy, her censorship of some of his writings, his wanting to avoid being attacked for his skeptical positions, and his wish to not tarnish his reputation or hinder the sale of his books. Twain withheld many religious views he thought his Hartford neighbors would consider outrageous or heretical. Examining Twain’s own statements, comments by his family, friends, and acquaintances, his funeral and obituaries, and the conflicting views of scholars, the author rejects both the arguments that Twain was an atheist, an agnostic, or a heretic and that many of his views accorded with conventional Christian faith. Instead, he argues that the religious views he expressed throughout his life are complicated and often contradictory; they convey his strong desire to make sense of the universe and his own life.","PeriodicalId":41060,"journal":{"name":"Mark Twain Annual","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"91346453","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
During the 1860s, Twain worked as a journalist in Virginia City, Nevada, and San Francisco and traveled to Europe and the Middle East (most notably Palestine) on an excursion with a group of Americans, which enabled him to write his best-selling Innocents Abroad. Twain met Olivia (Livy) Langdon through her brother, a fellow traveler. His courtship of the religiously devout Livy prompted Twain to reassess his relationship with God and his understanding of Christianity, prayer, and Providence and to declare himself to be a Christian. During this decade, Twain developed friendships with several ministers, battled depression, and struggled to determine his vocation. He also strove to adopt Eastern mores and conventional ethical practices and reinvent himself as a Christian husband who could provide financial security and spiritual guidance for his family. Scholars debate whether his conversion was genuine, self-deluded, or fabricated to please his future wife and her parents.
{"title":"The 1860s","authors":"G. Smith","doi":"10.2307/j.ctv11hprz7.10","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv11hprz7.10","url":null,"abstract":"During the 1860s, Twain worked as a journalist in Virginia City, Nevada, and San Francisco and traveled to Europe and the Middle East (most notably Palestine) on an excursion with a group of Americans, which enabled him to write his best-selling Innocents Abroad. Twain met Olivia (Livy) Langdon through her brother, a fellow traveler. His courtship of the religiously devout Livy prompted Twain to reassess his relationship with God and his understanding of Christianity, prayer, and Providence and to declare himself to be a Christian. During this decade, Twain developed friendships with several ministers, battled depression, and struggled to determine his vocation. He also strove to adopt Eastern mores and conventional ethical practices and reinvent himself as a Christian husband who could provide financial security and spiritual guidance for his family. Scholars debate whether his conversion was genuine, self-deluded, or fabricated to please his future wife and her parents.","PeriodicalId":41060,"journal":{"name":"Mark Twain Annual","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83501345","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-07-22DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192894922.003.0002
G. Smith
Twain was reared in Hannibal, a very religious small town in Missouri by a Presbyterian mother and a freethinking father. The “Presbyterian conscience” he developed as a youth deeply affected him throughout his life. Twain’s experiences in Sunday school and church and difficult childhood that included the loss of his father and two older siblings, fear of dying, and observations of drownings, murder, and mayhem are featured in many of his writings. Both Twain and many scholars have misrepresented the Calvinism that was preached and taught in antebellum Hannibal by portraying it as denying human free agency, preaching a prosperity gospel, damning the vast majority of people to perdition, and focusing on hell. Twain was especially affected by the death of his younger brother Henry as a result of a steamboat explosion when Twain was 22.
{"title":"1835–1860","authors":"G. Smith","doi":"10.1093/oso/9780192894922.003.0002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780192894922.003.0002","url":null,"abstract":"Twain was reared in Hannibal, a very religious small town in Missouri by a Presbyterian mother and a freethinking father. The “Presbyterian conscience” he developed as a youth deeply affected him throughout his life. Twain’s experiences in Sunday school and church and difficult childhood that included the loss of his father and two older siblings, fear of dying, and observations of drownings, murder, and mayhem are featured in many of his writings. Both Twain and many scholars have misrepresented the Calvinism that was preached and taught in antebellum Hannibal by portraying it as denying human free agency, preaching a prosperity gospel, damning the vast majority of people to perdition, and focusing on hell. Twain was especially affected by the death of his younger brother Henry as a result of a steamboat explosion when Twain was 22.","PeriodicalId":41060,"journal":{"name":"Mark Twain Annual","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74899646","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-01-01DOI: 10.5325/marktwaij.19.1.0005
Najjar
{"title":"Reflections from the Barbary Coast: Mark Twain on the Balloon of Transnational American Studies","authors":"Najjar","doi":"10.5325/marktwaij.19.1.0005","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/marktwaij.19.1.0005","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":41060,"journal":{"name":"Mark Twain Annual","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"70865568","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-01-01DOI: 10.5325/marktwaij.19.1.0139
McGunigal
{"title":"Reading and Editing “the Exquisitely Bad”","authors":"McGunigal","doi":"10.5325/marktwaij.19.1.0139","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5325/marktwaij.19.1.0139","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":41060,"journal":{"name":"Mark Twain Annual","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"70865631","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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